Empowering Love

Empowering Love

“Your approval ratings may and will go down…but you are a child of God.”  -Pastor at Reality LA

I’ve been thinking about family a lot lately.  The way families treat one another.  How I treat my family.  Do I exhibit the love to my family that I say I exhibit for humanity?  I don’t think that I do. 

Each person I have in my family is completely different from the next.  I have to accept them all the way that they are…the way that they come.  I looked up the definition of the word acceptance and it said, “And agreement to appreciate, validate, and support who a person or thing is in that moment.” 

But what do we do when we don’t feel that acceptance from our family?  As human beings we all have an innate desire for love and acceptance.  We seek it from our family, our friends, our romantic relationships…our job. The need for love and acceptance comes from our desire for community, fellowship, a place to thrive and find true fulfillment. 

But what happens when the love and acceptance we seek falls lacking in those areas?  I believe we fall prey to feelings of hatred and abandonment.  Lack of acceptance leads to a quest for approval…and a quest for approval from others always leads us down a dark, empty path…because how can you ever rise to expectations some one ELSE has set for you?  How much of what we do is based on gaining acceptance from other people?  And on the opposite side, how much of what we say to others is because we have preconceived notions of how they should be living their own lives?? 

But, if we cannot expect acceptance from those around us…where do we gain it?  Where can we find fulfillment?  All of these thoughts have led me back to God.  What is God like?  What is the nature of God?  Well, the nature of God is love.  The joy and relational aspect of God fulfills an aching, a longing in our heart that no one else’s physical acceptance can fill. 

I believe that when we seek acceptance and approval from others we allow them the opportunity to write our own lives for us.  We play a part that ends up not fulfilling us because…it’s someone else’s part.

It’s always blown my mind that we seek approval from people who are all imperfect themelves.  Or that I come across so many people who presume to know how someone ELSE should live their life…when only one person knows how you should live it…yourself.

As beautiful creations of a God who defines love…WE are enough…WE already have love and acceptance available to us.  We need only breathe it in and say…I will ACCEPT that ACCEPTANCE is already available to me.  I will grasp a hold of Love and say…I don’t need the affirmation of someone else’s love because I already have it in front of me.  The nature of God is love and that very notion enables us to turn away from the need for approval from others and truly be who we were called to be. 

The love I often give my family members is one where I presume to know what they should or should not be doing…and I watch other friends heart broken because of expectations placed on them by people who say they love them…but that type of love is debilitating…that type of love is not accepting.  The type of love God offers to us is POSITIVELY ENABLING…it is ACCEPTING…it is ETERNAL…it moves us FORWARD…it is EMPOWERING. 

What kind of love will I choose to submerse my heart, soul and mind in to?  What kind of love will I challenge myself to give to my family? Certainly not the kind that leaves me or others feeling unfulfilled, not good enough, lacking…as if I am doing something wrong…NO...I will live in to a rich, deep, powerful, gentle love that allows me and invites others to conquer the world and sore.  It’s the type of love that is available to you, to me…to all of us.